POWER SYSTEM PROTECTION

Unit 3 – Distance and Carrier Protection of Transmission Lines

MCQ
1. Reactance relay is normally used for protection against
a) Earth fault only
b) Phase fault only
c) Both earth and phase faults
d) None of the above
Ans: Earth fault only

2. Which of the following relay has inherent directional characteristics?

a) Mho
b) Reactance
c) Impedance
d) None of the above
Ans: Mho

3. The operating characteristics of the reactance relay in the complex impedance plane
is a
a) Circle with its origin at the centre of the R-X plane
b) Circle passing through the origin
c) Straight line passing through the origin
d) Straight line parallel to the X axis
Ans: Straight line parallel to the X axis

4. If source impedance is complex, then maximum power transfer occurs when the
load impedance is _______ the source impedance.
a) equal to
b) negative of
c) complex conjugate of
d) negative of complex conjugate of
Ans: Single bus-bar scheme

2 Marks
1. Define Distance relay.
A relay which measures impedance or a component of the impedance at the relay location
is known as a distance relay. It is used for the protection of a transmission line. As the impedance
of a line is proportional to the length of the line, a relay which measures impedance or its
component is called a distance relay.

2. Define Reactance relay and mho relay

Distance relay: A relay which measures reactance at the relay location is called a reactance
relay. It is a kind of a distance relay.
Mho Relay: This is a kind of a distance relay. It measures a particular component of the
Z
impedance, i.e.
cos(ϕ−θ)
where, ϕ is the power factor angle and θ is the design angle to shift MHO characteristic on the R-
X diagram. Its characteristic on the R-X diagram is a circle passing through the origin. It is a
directional relay. It is also known as an admittance or angle admittance relay.

3. What is mean by Power swing?

When a power system is operating in steady state, all the rotor or machine angles are
constant. Whenever there are sudden and large changes of power in the system, (say due to
outage of a major tie-line), the rotor angles undergo oscillations till the system reaches a new
stable state. This phenomenon is known as power swing.

4. Define reclosure.
Whenever a fault takes place, we can tentatively assume that a transient fault has
interrupted the supply. We then wait for a short while before switching on the circuit breaker.
This is known as reclosure. The reclosure can be carried out manually or automatically

Big Questions
1. Discuss in detail about the distance protection.
2. Explain the trip law for simple impedance relay, reactance relay and mho relay using
Universal Torque Equation.
3. Implement simple impedance relay using balanced beam structure and reactance relay,
mho relay using the induction cup structure.
4. Distinguish between Distance relays (Simple impedance relay, Reactance relay and mho
relay).
5. Discuss in detail about the Three-stepped Distance protection.